ACME WHITE LEAD AND COLOR WORKS 


OPENING OF THE NEW 
ADMINISTRATION BUILDING 


JUNE 5, 1906 


- AVERY LIBRARY 
-COLUIABIA UNIVERSITY 


SOUVENIR OF THE OPENING 


OF THE 


ADMINISTRATION BUILDING 


OBSERVATIONS: OF OUR FACTORY 
MANAGER, MR. GORDON MONTAGU 


ACME WHITE LEAD AND COLOR WORKS 
DETROIT, MICHIGAN, U.S. A. 


EXTERIOR VIEW OF ADMINISTRATION BUILDING 


= O the kind friends who visit 
MeV ius today we bid a hearty 
<1; welcome, and at the same 
MAME time we tender our sincere 
thanks. With most of you, we recog- 
nize that your interest in ‘‘Acmeville’’ 
is in line with the good work you 
have done, and are still doing, for the 
industrial betterment of Detroit. You 
are wise to understand that this kind 
-of betterment is far-reaching and that 
it involves something more than busi- 
ness success, because it affects the 
moral and material welfare of the com- 
munity as a whole. What matters it if 
the importance of your work is not 
always understood? You have within 
yourselves the consciousness of well- 
doing. 
It is natural for some men to take 
narrow views of broad questions, and it 


is certainly true, that while the light 
shines for all, there are men who 
strenuously object to come within its 
radiance. Of this, however, you may 
be assured, that while others are neither 
workers nor sympathizers, they will not 
object to a share in the fruit of your 
labors—they will be seated at the feast 
whether as bidden guests or not. 

It is frequently said by this class of 
critics, that betterment work along in- 
dustrial lines has its origin, not in the 
desire for public good, but in selfishness 
—that sentiment has no place in business. 
This, in our view and experience, is a 
very grave error. Self-interest has 
certainly to be considered, as but few 
men are in business, carrying the burden 
with its endless cares and worries, be- 
cause they love it; but rather to provide 
a competence for themselves and those 


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WILLIAM L. DAVIES H. KIRKE WHITE 
President Vice-President 


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ALBERT E. F. WHITE THOMAS NEAL 


Treasurer Secretary and General Manager 


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dependent on them. But while this is 
so, we hold it to be also true that business 
men, as a rule, are largely influenced by 
sentiment or kindly feeling. And why 
not? A business policy that eliminates 
sentiment, we judge to be not a good 
policy, and we know whereof we speak. 

There are things, precious things, that 
money can never buy. It can and does 
‘purchase perfunctory service, but it can 
not and does not purchase loyalty and 
good will, without which no service is 
worth the having. But the erroneous 
conclusions and hypercritical statements 
of those who are unwilling to assist in 
the laudable work of industrial and social 
advancement, need not be seriously con- 
sidered. If you, gentlemen, had been 
content with the day of small things, 
Detroit would have posed as a sorry 
figure, indeed. 


If the Acme White Lead and Color 
Works had been content with the day of 
small things, the Administration Build- 
ing, which you have done us the honor 
to inspect, would not have been re- 
quired or even possible. Happily for 
Detroit, the Spirit of Progress animates 
this firm as it does yourselves, and 
not the few, but all are really and truly 
benefited. 3 

If we are disposed to do just a little 
bragging on our own account, you will 
no doubt make proper allowance, and 
consider the justification. In the past 
we “tooted our little horn’’ because it 

was all-sufficient. If we now require a 
megaphone, who will question the wis- 
dom of its use? Modesty never counsels 
real merit to conceal itself; modesty 
counsels none to be backward where 
duty points the way—we blush, but we 
do our duty. 


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Having passed our twenty-first mile- 
stone, we are now of legal age, and have 
reached the stature of manhood. It is 
common to speak of growth, but it is 
thought and not mere growth that makes 
perfect manhood. It is largely because 
our thinking apparatus has been in good 
order that we are able to welcome you 
without apology for that which might 
have been, being reasonably satisfied 
with that which is. We presume that it 
is fair to say that we have taken advan- 
tage of opportunities, but we can also 
say that if opportunity was tardy in 
coming our way, it has been part of our 
business policy to go out and look for it. 

We first saw daylight in 1884, and 
although our environment might have 
been more pretentious, at this time we 
feel no particular embarrassment at the 
reminiscence. The greatest events in the 


world’s history dawned with no more 
noise than the morning star makes in 
rising, for which reason you, gentlemen, 
may not have particularly noted our 
birth, but of the fact that we were born 
there can be no doubt. 

Corporations are very much like in- 
dividuals, inasmuch as there are certain 
Stages, each marking an epoch in the 
history of life. It was no doubt a for- 
tunate circumstance that we were nursed 
by those who understood the art of 
nursing, and so in due time we waxed 
fat and lusty. We had our infantile 
troubles, but even in our colicky days 
there was indicated lung power and per- 
sistence that demanded our share of pap. 
Since then, we have been too busy in 
caring for what we got to worry over 
what we failed to get. 


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In youth, we built our castles and, as 
events proved, we builded better than 
we knew. If we live to the close of the 
current year, we will probably have mul- 
_tiplied our original capital two hundred 
and twenty times, or an average of ten 
times for each year of our existence. For 
a strictly manufacturing business, void of 
all speculative features, it does sound in- 
credible, does it not? Yet the facts are 
there to say so. 

“How has it been accomplished? What 
is the secret of success?’’ you ask. These 
are questions much easier asked than 
answered. Perhaps a combination of 
many things; certainly no one thing. — 
There may be secrets locked within the 
recesses of some one brain, to account 
for or to command success, but we doubt 
it. Neither do we believe in the old saw 
of ‘‘good luck.’’ We prefer to think that 


good luck is the pay for patience and 
preseverance along intelligent and proper 
lines. 

We affirm that a prerequisite for 
business success is knowledge. That 
the Acme White Lead and Color Works 
has, in an eminent degree, that 
knowledge covering paints and var- 
nishes and that the “Acme Quality’’ 
products are of the highest degree of 
excellence, goes without the saying; but 
this does not fully answer the question. 

We know it to be a fundamental 
principle of business, that success or 
failure depends largely on the quality of 
management. We do not recall that bad 
management ever harvested a crop of 
anything more valuable than liabilities. 
So far as the Acme White Lead and 
Color Works is concerned, the quality 
of management is not obscured. It is to 


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be seen in the records and in the visible 
signs of material progress, our new 
Administration Building and those other 
buildings which cover our fourteen 
acres of ground; but even this does 
not answer your questions or explain 
the why and the wherefore. What then 
- shall we say? 

The destiny of ‘“Acmeville’’ has from 
the inception, been controlled by the 
same hands, William L. Davies, President, 
H. Kirke White, Vice-President, A. E. F. 
White, Treasurer, Thomas Neal, Sec- 
retary and General Manager—all of whose 
photographs are shown on the pages of 
this booklet. To many of you they are 
fimiliar. You know the faces and you 
know the men. Perhaps, so knowing, 
- you may consider the questions answered 
but may yet be in doubt as to there being 
some valuable secret. 


Gentlemen, the Acme White Lead 
and Color Works has no secret in this — 
connection. There are contributory 
causes for our phenomenal success, but 
they are invoked by the system of man- 
agement which recognizes in every other 
man,amanandabrother. This explains 
why we have more than the usual num- 
ber of old employes whose service is near- 
ly coeval with the life of the firm. Our 
management has faith in the personal 
equation—the magnetism which draws 
and retains the services of competent 
assistants. ‘They fight and win battles. 
‘They face all kinds of difficulties with 
the steadiness of veterans, and they re- 
lieve of a burden which otherwise would 
become intolerable. In fact, this kind of 
management inspires a loyalty and co- 
operation, which for the Acme White 
Lead and Color Works has been im- 


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mensely effective. Good will is a mighty 
factor in business life, but it must be 
sincere, for unless a man has that good 
will in his own heart, he will certainly 
fail to inspire it in others. He can fool 
- himself, but is not likely to successfully 
fool others. 

There was a time when managers 
considered it indispensable that they 
build walls and dig ditches, that the 
endless detail was “‘up to them,” and 
so they went to their graves, unhonored 
and unsung. For up-to-date manage- 
- ment, that day has passed. Time is too 
precious to be frittered' away on the 
smaller things which a smaller man can 
do as readily, or better. 

Management may be either harsh or 
beneficent. The former rarely pays, 
and the latter rarely fails. The rank and 


file are always and particularly worth a 
little extra consideration. 

In your wanderings around ‘‘Acme- 
ville’? today you probably noted that 
sanitary conditions were on a par with 
the best. The business of our laundry is 
to supply towels and aprons to meet all 
requirements. In our store-room you 
saw stocks of coffee, tea and sugar. Milk 
comes in fresh daily. At the noon hour 
tables are loaded with cups and saucers 
and coffee pots. It is there free, not for 
the asking, but for the helping of one’s 
self. In the cafe you will have noted 
how clerks and heads of departments are 
provided for. 

In a remote part of the main stock 
building ‘‘far from the madding crowd,’’ 
there is a little room where the tem- 
porarily sick may recline until better or 
be visited by a physician. A well stocked 


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library supplies mental pabulum for 
those who need or desire. A music room 
with an excellent piano, magazines, etc., 
provides both rest and recreation. A 
convention hall with a seating capacity 
- of one thousand gives facilities for 
banquets, dances, reunions, etc. A re- 
lief association furnishes financial aid 
in sickness, accident insurance pro- 
vides for disability—and so it goes. 
Anything which tends to ameliorate the 
condition of factory life, without impair- 
ing efficiency or discipline, is within the 
-scope of Acme management, and possibly 
reveals the secret you are looking for or 
answers the questions you have asked. 
The Scriptural command, that breth- 
ren shall agree, is not always observed 
in business life, and directors may have 
conflicting ideas which are not con- 
ductive to business health or longevity. 


Each can claim the right to ride his own 
hobby, but there are times when it is 
better that the hobby be left in the stable. 
Assuming that a directorate of four men 
could harmonize so perfectly during the 
long period of twenty-one years that in 
the retrospect not one discordant note 
was apparent, that mutual confidence 
had kept pace with the passing years, 
would you be surprised that the result 
spelled Success? ‘That, gentlemen, is the 
Acme White Lead and Color Works ina 
nutshell. How does it strike you? Is 
this one of the secrets you are looking 
for? Pretty good policy all around is it 
not? 

We are not claiming that the concen- 
trated wisdom of ages is under our hat 
—only the level-headed, ordinary com- 
mon sense, adapted for use every week- 
day in the year. If we ever had a wee’ 


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sma’ doubt as to our ability, and we are 
not concious of such, we surely never 
had a doubt of our intentions or determi- 
nation to ‘‘win out’’ and to ‘‘get there.’’ 
Perhaps this also should be counted in 
_ the grand total. 

When we speak of opening mail from 
all parts of this terrestial sphere, we are 
speaking ‘“‘by the book,’’ and if we thrill 
because ‘‘Acme Quality”? girdles the 
earth, it is certainly up to us to do the 
thrilling. 

There are firms, like certain individ- 
uals, who deem it necessary to apologize 
for their existence. The Acme White 
Lead and Color Works has no such 
apology to make. We honesily believe 
that the world is the better for our hav- 
ing existed. We have played our little 
part the best we knew. While there has 
been much of pain, there has also been 


much of pleasure in the playing, and not 
the least of our pleasure is in the reflec- 
tion and profound consciousness of ob- 
ligation and indebtedness to our numer- 
ous friends, among whom, gentlemen, 
Wwe are proud to include yourselves. 

And so we again thank you for your 
presence, issue you a cordial invitation 
to come again, and yet again. You will 
not wear out your welcome. 


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